In All the Noisy World
by Cutter
Summary: An odd little Draco fic which came to mind from places unknown.


Hello all,  
  
Yes. So I was supposed to be working on my other fic, when around 11 pm last night I had this sudden collage in my head--visions of Draco. How his mind, his surroundings, everything might work. In my head, naturally, it was perfect.  
  
And then it somehow turned into this. [sweatdrop] I am really not sure if I managed to communicate _anything_ of those original, (to me) pleasing ideas. But this, at any rate, represents my try.  
  
Disclaimers: JKR owns the names; I just put a little spin on the neuroses. The title made sense to Tekka. [shrugs]  
Warnings: None.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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In All the Noisy World  
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"Well, when you think about it, school is really just a kind of prison, isn't it?"  
  
"Blaise, do you _have_ to keep going on about this? It's _November_. We're all _bored_ with it already. Just because you didn't pass the Charms exam. . . ."  
  
". . .and so I told her, Pansy Parkinson does _not_ and will NEVER go out with a--"  
  
"--bloody Gryffindor thinks he knows something about it, so I said if he was so upset he could just go crying to--"  
  
"--someone's _brother_, and frankly if You-Know-Who doesn't hex them all to kingdom come it'll be a miracle, I'm sure, and--"  
  
"Draco? Are you freezing your quills again?"  
  
Draco blinked, one hesitant voice among many finally registering itself in his consciousness. He forced himself to turn around and focus on the face of Vincent Crabbe, which was registering an expression of practiced neutrality. The room around them was a study in noise and motion, and nobody seemed to have taken any notice of them as yet.  
  
His quill was, in fact, frozen into a neatly feathered icepick.  
  
"Well, Crabbe, considering the quill _is_, in fact, frozen, I rather think I _must_ have frozen it, don't you?"  
  
Crabbe, having known Draco Malfoy for nearly all of their fourteen years, didn't balk at this. He seemed to decide instead that the other boy's tone indicated relative safety. "Isn't it your day to write to your parents?"  
  
When Draco looked down, there did seem to be a half-finished parchment on the table underneath his idle hand. Further investigation revealed a neatly scripted missive from Mother by his elbow. He absently spelled his quill back to its normal temperature, which seemed to satisfy Crabbe, who turned back to his own studies.  
  
Well, no sense in putting off the inevitable. He placed the two parchments next to each other, to verify that their contents were suitably matched.  
  
  
  

    
    
    _Dear Draco,
    Enclosed in the package are two winter sweaters the house elves
    say you left at home. Your Father is busy at the Ministry and
    I have been selecting a new vanity mirror for the Berlin Room.
    Hopefully you have not spent all your allowance and are keeping
    up your grades.
    Dear Mother and Father,
    Everything is fine. I received your letter and also the winter
    sweaters._
    

  
  
The first letter ended with his mother's seal. He hadn't gotten any farther with his reply before his attention had wandered--God, the din in the Common Room was horrid. Draco decided now that there actually wasn't any real need to write any more. He folded it, dropped a protection spell on it, and sealed it prominently on the outside (the house elves sorted the mail more easily that way). Thus finished with his correspondence, and done with his homework well into the next week, he cast about for inspiration on what to do next.  
  
". . .I know; I heard yesterday that awful Brown girl _dyes_ her hair. . ."  
  
". . .they didn't rely on this pacifistic resistance system, just a front for plain laziness and cowardice if you ask me, then the whole thing would be a different issue, and He Who Must Not Be Named is certainly. . ."  
  
". . .three OWLs or Mom'll kill me and--"  
  
"--Anything going, Vincent?" he asked, to make sure.  
  
"Pansy's planning to charm the Gryffindor Girls' Garret to make any virgins who enter sneeze violently when they smell her perfume at breakfast. Goyle is in detention for snoring in Transfiguration again. I overheard Professor Flitwick say that if you use a freezing spell on the same object too many times, it will crack into pieces when you unfreeze it. There's nobody in the boys' bedroom." Crabbe lifted his head from his Potions essay and met Draco's gaze briefly.  
  
"How long?"  
  
"I figure twenty minutes."  
  
Twenty minutes.  
  
To Draco, it seemed an excellent time to adjourn to his bed, pull the drapes, and stare at nothing for awhile. He withdrew his things from the table, and silently walked off.  
  
  
  
  


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Sometimes he wondered if his mind was made of ice.  
  
Today he had been asked questions in Potions, Charms, Arithmancy. He remembered to get one of them half-wrong. The lectures passed through him and into a file somewhere inside, where he could doubtless access them later if necessary. He navigated the hallways. He ate. Just for the hell of it, he froze his quill and then spelled it orange.  
  
Sometime during the evening, Goyle informed him that he was standing in front of an open window. He said something cruel and Goyle went away. Goyle wasn't the smartest flavor in the beanbag, but he wasn't about to go arguing with a Malfoy who wasn't in the mood for it, either.  
  
Draco, on the other hand, had a mind like an icetrap. He had since first year kept a careful watch on his grades to keep them from getting too high to escape attention. A Slytherin only needed to attract so much of a certain kind of attention before he started being asked extremely troublesome questions. Though if he had to sit through another hopelessly overcomplicated Granger proof for a simple piece of Arithmancy, he might seriously consider freezing his entire worktable as a distraction and attention be damned.  
  
Granted she was the only other person in the entire third year with more than six brain cells to her name. It might be interesting to. . .well, no, a Mudblood was still a Mudblood.  
  
Maybe he would ask Snape for permission into the Restricted Section to look for a Potions book he hadn't read yet. He was pretty sure Snape was a spy working for Dumbledore's side, but the man at least appreciated the value of something concocted subtly and well. No, Draco shouldn't have to worry about anything there.  
  
Crabbe came by to bring him a sweater.  
  
He leaned one hip against the windowsill and stared out onto the Hogwarts grounds. The wind blew in and he let it blow through him.  
  
  
  
  


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"I think being in Ravenclaw is the same as being labeled 'socially doomed.'"  
  
"Quit sneezing into the food!"  
  
". . .and it's _your_ turn to pair with Neville in Potions next week, because honestly. . ."  
  
". . .they really didn't want to do this originally, but I hear--"  
  
"--something about the amount of energy in the reactor causing it to overheat and melt the pins all around it and--" "--the blooming 'ell is a 'reactor,' and why's 'e talkin' about sodding Muggle papers 'fore we've even 'ad a proper breakfast, is wot I'd like to--"  
  
"Know when you're going to get in those new Quidditch knee-guards?" Draco asked.  
  
The Great Hall was teeming with people, and as usual Draco sorted himself out from among the cacophony of voices by using his own. The world shrank down to a bearable size. "Tomorrow, maybe," said Marcus Flint. "Say, is your fork frozen?"  
  
"Yes," said Draco, eyes very wide and very serious.  
  
Blaise turned to look. "And your fork is frozen because. . . ."  
  
Draco ignored this. The Zabinis were not anyone to worry about, and Blaise was three months his junior. "Crabbe. My family has known your family for nine generations. For all of their sakes, I'll say this once, very slowly. Give me back my quill."  
  
"Of course, Draco."  
  
The quill was passed quietly across the table.  
  
"Very wise decision."  
  
He picked up his ice-encrusted fork and took a bite of egg.  
  
There was a momentary lull on the Slytherin side before noise rushed in to fill the vacuum again. "You know, the boy's a brilliant flyer, but sometimes I think he's starkers. . . ."  
  
  
  
  


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It had all started with water.  
  
At that point, even before Hogwarts, there were already things he was expected to do, but it had been so long since something had really captured his _attention_. He had been ignoring both social and familial obligation, hiding from the Christmas houseguests and searching for a new spell he could learn to take the edge off.  
  
Something complicated, that would take a few minutes to figure out. After he learned it, he probably wouldn't care anymore, but those precious seconds of concentration and then understanding--they distracted him from the odd hollowness that had developed inside him.  
  
That thing that allowed him to stare, numb, abstracted, for hours. A vacancy, maybe.   
  
He scanned down the page of his father's Dictionary of Advanced Intermediate Spells, page open to a graphic explanation of "Frogs, turning into." Hmmm. He scanned the study, searching for something to transform into a frog. There were many things his father would not miss.  
  
Draco's father was as good at ignoring things as he was.  
  
"Draco! Come say hello to the Averys; they're just passing through!" And indeed, there were the Averys right on the other side of the study's icicled window.  
  
"Yes, mother."  
  
Everything was just passing through. He knew that.  
  
One of the icicles was interesting, though; it seemed to glint light not coincidentally but maliciously--right into his eyes, right onto the page. Draco raised the window, sending a small wave to the departing family.  
  
Then he reached around the pane and wrapped a hand around the icicle. He was somehow surprised that he could feel the cold--rather like a kind of burn. He snapped it off and brought it inside.   
  
In a rush of cascading intuitions, a number of things began to make sense to Draco then. It was clear that he and the icicle were similar, related entities. If he stared hard enough, he would no doubt be able to make out the internal crystalline formation, and it would match the obscure systems of his own molecules. The rhythms of its composition would echo the slow and transparent running of his own eleven years. Yes, clearly a transfixing thing, this. Like a Malfoy should be--smooth, and sharp. Honed down to a fine point. He found himself staring at it with a concentration he barely remembered. Maybe, for the first time in his life, a curiosity.  
  
Some time later, it was moving toward him. This made sense, too.  
  
He helped it along.  
  
The frozen point pressed against his fingertip experimentally, and then against it a little harder, and harder and yet a little fraction harder. The first drop of blood welled up against it in a single perfect bead. Draco stared, mesmerized.  
  
Curiosity became knowledge.  
  
  
  
  


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". . .I'm telling you, we ought to just take him to the infirmary and leave him there, the bloody wanker. . ."  
  
". . .taking up our practice time. . ."  
  
". . .passing out on the field, but we should probably still--"  
  
"--somebody get him--"  
  
"--I'll take the right arm, and you can--"  
  
"--bloody hell, would you look at the--all over his arms--chest too--"  
  
"--see Crabbe, I toldja somethin' was funny--"  
  
"--shut up, Goyle, he's the one told _you_ something was funny--great git--"  
  
Draco was back in the present.  
  
"Draco, are you awake?"  
  
He thought so. "I think so. Is that Vincent? Got a pounding headache. . . ."  
  
Crabbe seemed almost amused by this revelation. "Goyle hit a wild beater into the middle of the field, and you were the only one who wasn't paying enough attention to dodge properly. Lucky it hit your broom and not your head." He leaned down, and in a moment Draco was helped to his feet, wincing all the way. Pain was blossoming from a spot in the back of his head out to all points in his body. He must have fallen, Draco reflected.  
  
"So you began undressing me. Of course."  
  
Yes, that almost-smile was definitely edging towards a laugh. "Well, the hiking up your shirt was incidental. To them trying to get you up, and all." After all, Crabbe was a Slytherin. You couldn't blame him for taking joy in another's misfortune once in awhile, Draco supposed. But there was an oddly sober light in the back of his eyes. Draco smoothed his shirt back into place.  
  
"In the three or more years that we have all been at this _fine_ institution, exactly _how_ many times have you lot seen someone conjure a stretcher? Did that occur to _no one_?"   
  
Several (but notably not all) of Slytherin's Quidditch players had the grace or the intelligence to avert their eyes and look a bit ashamed. _Morons_, he told himself, _morons, all of them. . . ._  
  
He finally suffered himself to be delivered to the Hospital Wing, mostly to get rid of the rest of his teammates, who were experienced enough with the Malfoy temper (seldom truly roused, but legendary) to leave him to Crabbe and Goyle without complaint. They were about halfway there, the two to either side of him as guards, when Crabbe said, "Anything going, Draco?"  
  
"Anything?"  
  
"Oh," the careful voice continued, "at home, for instance? With your father?"  
  
For once, Draco was genuinely surprised. "Why would anything be?"  
  
Crabbe's glance slid toward his chest, and then delicately away. Goyle, lacking the blessings of finesse and prudence, yanked up his shirt briefly and exclaimed, "These scars! It's like a bunch of little tiny burns! Did--I mean, did Mr. Malfoy do 'em. We knew something was funny--we heard a rumor--"  
  
Now this was a surprise. "My father would never lay a hand on me. Are you mad?"  
  
Clearly, Goyle at least was not done, and Crabbe still had a troubled look, but both of them were forced to delay pursuing the topic, because suddenly they had reached the Hospital Wing door and Pomfrey was bustling out to meet them.  
  
They were noticing, though. Maybe Draco needed a new hobby.  
  
Madam Pomfrey ran off to fetch him a pain potion. Absently, he filched his quill from Crabbe's pocket (honestly--what was it with Crabbe and his quill these days?) and froze it.  
  
It was just that. . .he was really so dull inside. The thought of Voldemort never seemed very personal; no family or friends fully occupied his thoughts. Classes were certainly less than engaging. Focus on one of these idiots and you focused them down to nothing--just look at the Weasel. Same reaction every bloody time you teased the git. What could there possibly around _here_ that would hold his attention?   
  
"So how long has it been?" asked Crabbe.  
  
He jerked his mind back from a place some distance away. What had they been talking. . .oh. "Oh, about three years," he said.  
  
"Maybe you need a challenge."  
  
A challenge. Probably he did, at that.  
  
Something that would challenge him, but not smell of old potions or leave physical marks.  
  
". . ._burned_ himself, you say?"  
  
". ..and how you boys'll manage to stay alive through graduation I will never know. First that poor second-year, and then Mr. Malfoy (unfreeze that thing this instant, young man), and then. . ."  
  
". . .swear, if you get one more injury from doing something stupid like this, I'll--"  
  
"--be climbing up the bloody _chimney_, 'just curious to see _where it went_,' for Merlin's sake--"   
  
"--and it's not my fault the fires at Hogwarts don't know they're supposed to be at bottom and not out the top, so--"  
  
His best monogrammed quill shattered to pieces in his hands. Goyle cursed. Perhaps he'd been in the path of some of the fallout.  
  
"--you thought there was something _in_ it? If you were anyone else, I swear you'd've been expelled by now, Harry Potter--"  
  
Almost against his will, Draco found himself turning around.  
  
"--don't 'Harry Potter' me; I'm in pain here!"  
  
Harry Potter. Of course.  
  
Of course.  
  
  
  
  
  
  


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Heh. Yes. That's all.  
  
It's one of those times when I think that if I'd explained my thoughts to some other author, they might've been able to fashion them into a fic that would get them across better. But being you all read to the end, I hope that you were able to extract some idea of the Draco I was envisioning last night around 11 pm.  
  
Thanks for reading! And hey, comment, if you've got time and you wouldn't mind. ^_~ 


End file.
